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(What I'm saying is Hollywood does this thing where they create a character, a stereotype–only girl in the movie is the damsel in distress. And then to combat that, instead of just diversifying, they end up creating another character stereotype that's a direct response–she's the only girl because she's strong and independent and grew up with brothers. And, you know, sometimes they don't really understand representation. It's not finite, you know. You don't have to change one character into something else, you just make another character. Cuz that's not gaining anything. You murder a murderer and there's the same number of murderers in the world.
And everyone's obsessed with this idea of three act structure. This idea of save the cat and the hero's journey. "Aristotle wrote a book a gazillion years ago" and "it's just the way we naturally tell stories." I'm not saying it's wrong, I'm just saying I think that's a very tired way of looking at storytelling-
Wade are you listening to me?)
We're on air.
(Good, the people should hear about this.)
No, I mean shut up.
Hey guys.
(Woah look who's back! Where'd you go?)
Nowhere, really. We don't really exist once you, well, close the tab.
I wish I could tell you I walked, but I don't know what my body looks like–if I have one. I don't even know if I have thoughts and feelings, or if I'm just afflicted with personification. Do you know how many hoops it takes to get to me? I'm the representation of an author interpreted into a narrator representing a voice.
(That's deep.)
It was empty. Completely white. No way of knowing what was up or down, left or right. And quiet. Very quiet. I thought maybe if I kept going forward long enough, I'd find the border. Maybe the door to… something. Another fic? I don't know. But turns out it doesn't really work like that.
(How'd you find your way back?)
I don't know. I was meant to be here, I guess.
Let's get on with the show though?
Yeah, let's.
Okay. Right.
Wade's um, oh. Wade's dead. (Not dead. It would have been a lot more dramatic if he died.)
Sorry to disappoint.
(It's my fault for expecting anything good to begin with.)
Anyways, Wade's brain was reforming. Whether he died or not didn't matter at the end of the day, he always came back.
Yay for the insignificance of living.
I wouldn't call it insignificant.
(You're so right. There'd be one less murderer in the world. That's significant.)
Can't argue with that logic.
Okay, I feel out of practice. How long was I gone according to you guys?
(One fic. Pretty insignificant. I like this word. Insignificant.)
Okay, uh, okay.
Wade.
Yes?
No, I meant Wade as in- I'm trying to do this.
Wade. Wade- what are we doing?
(Are you okay?)
I think I've fallen out of God's good graces.
What.
Nothing, okay. Here we go.
He, Wade, has at least one safehouse in every borough of New York, and he has them all named. Like his secret bachelor pad he calls the "Clubhouse" which is the most like a mancave. (Like the ones guys talk about on HGTV.) He also has a place he calls "The Cave" because the number of windows that actually let light into the place is 1, and that's being generous. It's also cold in there and a little wet. Really lives up to it's name.
The Cave is great. (It makes Wade want to die.) It's great. This is the "cool, dry place" everything always wants to be stored in. (Did we not just say The Cave is a little wet?)
So, Wade's brain reforms, and it's great. (What is up with you and the word great?) If you say one more thing, I'm going to erase you from existence, thank you.
Hey, you. Are you ever falling asleep, and you think of something and it's gr- it's something you want to remember, and you tell yourself you'll remember when you wake up, but you don't, you just remember wanting to remember something? (Holy run on sentence Batman!)
(Sorry sorry I'm sorry.)
Anyways, that ever happen to you? Well, that's kind of what it's like when Wade tries to think about thoughts he had before his brain needed to be reformed. It's just a continuous cycle of walking into a room and forgetting why it is you walked into that room.
But Wade remembers wanting to go to the drugstore, he just doesn't remember what he wanted there. He's sure he'd know it when he sees it though. So, with a newly reformed brain, that's what Wade did. And he's buying the oddest assortment of items when he ran into none other than Parker.
(We want to call him Peter now.)
We do?
I never said all that.
(No, but I did.)
Okay, fine. We ran into Peter.
"Hey," he said casually, his eyes flicking to the things in Wade's hand.
Maybe it was the way Peter had just walked in and had nothing in his own hands that had Wade almost feel the need to be embarrassed, like he should hold everything behind his back or, better yet, act like he didn't have anything at all. It's getting caught being human with a life, seeing your teacher outside of the school environment.
"Parker. You exist outside of the confines of my say so?"
"It appears like it. Or I'm in for a rude awakening."
"Ready for the rude awakening?"
"Oh no," Peter replied dryly. "I'm dematerializing before my very eyes."
"You jest, but it's a very traumatic thing for some people."
"Uh huh." Peter's eyes roamed over Wade's items again. "Should I be worried?"
He's buying: an excessive amount of cough syrup and painkillers, a candle, and peach rings.
"What this? Oh no, I just shoot myself like God intended."
"Now I'm even more worried, actually."
"What are you here for?" Wade redirected.
"I'm out of batteries."
(I love the people who buy a single thing at the store, and you see them carrying it and you're like "why did this guy buy a single jar of pickles what's his story" and you'll never know.) Thank you.
"Boring."
"Thanks."
Peter lingered for a moment, waiting for Wade to say something else. (It radiated off of him, the wanting of continuing a conversation without knowing how.)
That's what Peter was like. He has a sharp tongue he doesn't use. Peter talks to us, but all the time we spend watching him he doesn't make a sound. We think he has friends at The Bugle, but we can't be sure when the most interaction we see from his is a tight smile. He says "good morning" by tucking his head when he walked by people on the way to his desk. J.J.J.'s secretary will wave at him, and he does little more than show his palm.
He gets lunch at the same hot dog cart where they know his order without him saying anything. His polite upbringing of always saying "please" and "thank you" has persisted but quieted over time to just give the idea of the expression without actually having to say the words. "Excuse me's" aren't excused when he makes room. The loudest he gets is during the small talk and attempts at humor of minimum-wage workers, and they get nothing more than a faux chuckle that's little more than his vocal cords vibrating to make a hum.
And yet he's, Wade hates to admit it, incredibly nice. (Peter's managed to give off the hardened exterior of a scary dog while looking like just a little guy.) Because when that secretary talks to him, he seems so much brighter and, even, endearing. He helped the couple who was trying, and failing, to get to downtown Manhattan with the most disarming smile a person could have without veering into insincerity. And he was, sincere. Peter's just like Spidey in the way his demeanor changes completely around children. He goes from this stick up his ass hater to Mr. Rogers. He's seen Peter exhibit that sort of patience you only see in kindergarten teachers. Or just the teachers that end up changing your life for the better. We are actually doing a disservice to him with this description. Peter goes out of his way. He does wonders for the overstimulated.
Wade wondered why Peter never went into teaching. He had a knack for it.
Maybe it's his face. He has this sort of timeless face, where it's not sharpened enough to have lost the baby fat, but not rounded enough to be a baby face. Wade thinks Peter looks very soft in terms of facial features. On the Spidey discussion forums, someone once said "I've met Peter Parker. He has a calming presence." Wade read that and thought they met the wrong Peter Parker because while all the above is true, there's genuinely something a little off about the photographer.
There's something about his eyes that make you feel like you're almost getting looked at by more than just two. There was something violent to them.
"Why don't you talk to people?" Wade asked suddenly.
"What do you mean?"
"You seem weird. Unapproachable. When you don't talk."
"Do you think I'm spooky?"
"You can't distract me by bringing Mulder from X-files into this. Do people sit next to you on public transport?"
"I can't go on subways anymore actually. There's too much. Same reason I hate shopping. I don't, uh, do well in crowds."
"Are you agoraphobic or something? Misanthrope? How do you participate in society alone?"
"Poorly."
He punctuated his answer with a small smile, amusing himself before anyone else.
(Henry Cavendish, right? He discovered hydrogen. They say he dressed in an old fashion suit that was actually his only one, and that he was also incredibly shy, so much so he didn't even publish his own work. He didn't really speak to people, and if he did it was one male at a time–not women, women got notes. If you wanted to talk to him, you could try and say something smart in his vicinity and maybe he'd mutter some reply, but it was most likely he wouldn't. He didn't seem to foster any deep relationships outside of his own family.)
What's the moral of the story here?
(I just don't think it's fair to comment on someone's worth based on how much they act in accordance with society. So, he's a square peg in a round hole. Let him keep his corners. God knows we weren't made to fit either.)
You really like Peter, don't you?
"You look so much nicer when you smile," Wade found himself saying.
Peter didn't answer. His face returned to a resting position, and we can't tell exactly what he's thinking, but he shifted his weight from one foot to another and asked:
"Can we not stand in the middle of the store?"
"You need a haircut though," Wade added, belated and a little too loud. (As if it could undercut the compliment.) "Go to your barber."
"I cut my own hair," Peter explained. He's a bit more comfortable in this topic–Wade is too. "In the bathroom mirror, I just snip off the ends when I feel like it's getting too much."
"So that's why it looks like trash."
"No it- it does not."
Peter didn't wait for a response, he turned on his heels, searching for and finding the beauty aisle. Wade followed behind him, still carrying all his groceries somehow. (You ever try to hand a toddler something while they're already holding something else, so they drop the first thing to grab the second thing? That's like Wade except slightly more conscious. I say we pocket the things in hammer space. Like Animal Crossing.)
I knew we should have grabbed a shopping basket.
(Hubris, our fatal flaw.)
Peter was looking at himself in the mirror, focused on his hair, picking at strands between his fingers and running his hands through the length. He didn't even spare a glance when Wade poked his head into the frame.
"Does it?" he muttered.
"Let's just say a certain subculture from the 80s would love you."
"Fine." Peter still didn't stop touching his own hair. "You want to do better?"
"No can do, I'm not allowed to use scissors without adult supervision."
"Then I guess we'll both have to deal with it."
There's a softness to the way Peter spoke, like it was something self-soothing he's said before.
Peter doesn't have mirrors in the house except the one in his bathroom. To Wade, that's almost the most dangerous one. He always thought mirrors made him look fake. He feels the need to be more animated, put on a show and push and pull at his face when he sees himself because there's an audience and now, he can see what they see.
Then again, Wade doesn't like seeing his face–outside of the mask at least. It's enough to know what's under there without having to see it. He looked at Peter fiddling with a section of hair between his figures. He's getting lost in his own appearance in the mirror. Wade knew that look.
Maybe man shouldn't be able to see his own face, and maybe the inventor of the mirror did poison the human heart. But it was Narcissus that looked down in the water at his own reflection and fell in love. Not because it was himself, but because he couldn't see that it was. And maybe, if it had been a mirror, he would've loved himself.
(Counter point: some say Narcissus did recognize his reflection as his own, yet he's enraptured by it anyways. This "other person" doesn't exist, and it can never love him back because, he knows, it's just him. The struggle is he sees through himself and into the abstractness of seeing something beautiful. It wasn't him that was beautiful and that he fell in love with, but something he saw inside of himself. But he could only see it when staring at his reflection.
It's not about narcissism. He didn't need a mirror. He had people infatuated with him, but he wanted to be loved for what they saw beyond his appearance. But he was the only one that could do that. It's about would you marry me if everyone saw me as a pig, despite the beautiful woman I am inside that meat suit?)
You two talk too much.
(I think we should make out.)
I think you should calm down.
(Wade missed you. I missed you.)
(Did you miss us?)
I was a zoo animal, scratching at the confines of my enclosure and desperate to escape as if I know there was an entire world out there I'm supposed to be a part of.
But I was born in captivity. And the outside world is not made for me. That knowledge is my burden. But you know what I learned while I was out there? I was constantly focused on chasing the next part of the story instead of letting myself be in the now. That maybe this right here is okay. That every paragraph, every sentence, is made up of small, good things that I wasn't stopping to acknowledge.
You focus too hard on everything else, on what you should or could be, that you lose who you are. What I'm saying is, I thought I didn't like being here. And I haven't been the nicest to you all the time, but it's nice. That you're here. That I'm not alone.
All of you, really.
But yeah. We still have a lot to get through so unless you want to take 5 or something, I'm just going to keep going.
Just please tell me Spider-Man shows up.
We'll see.
Wade missed the moment Peter stopped looking at himself and started looking at him. Though Peter isn't looking at Wade with some type of identifiable emotion, the latter seems like a common trend. They matched eyes in the mirror and somehow that feels different than when they're staring face to face. Wade broke the eye contact within the following second. (Coward.)
"What do you need batteries for?"
"Camera," Peter replied simply.
He turned away as well, not just from looking at Wade but the mirror itself. Again, Wade followed Peter when he walked.
"You ever tinker?"
"Occasionally." Peter spared a glance. "I see we're hanging out then."
"That's what you think."
"What would you call it? Kismet?"
"Kismet is a word choice."
"I swear to- " Peter stopped, giving Wade his attention for a moment before deciding it wasn't worth it. He continued along with the more controlled response: "First of all, it's Arabic not Yiddish."
"I didn't say anything-"
"Seriously, you cannot go one conversation without making insinuations?"
"It is the only way I cope with the fact that you're one of those white people that feels Latino," Wade confessed.
That's the thing about not being real. The continuity of your likeness is a bit more lax. Early comics didn't even have consistent eye colors. Artist after artist, depiction after depiction things change from facial features to body build. Do you like slim over buff? Then if you're not an artist yourself, you better hope the comic artists for that comic does too. You better hope you like the art period. Spidey can be drawn with almost as much variety as our skin. ("Comic book accurate appearance" is not as cut and dry as some would like you to believe.)
"You thought I was Latino?" Peter asked, stopping again.
"I thought you were at least a little Mexican."
"Where on earth did you get that idea from?"
(With how Mexico claimed Spider-Man in the 70s, how could he not be?)
At least we'd get half-Mexican Spider-Man 2099.
(Yeah, only twenty years after their homemade comics got snuffed out by the white man. J.K. Jim Galton, bestie, I love you.)
Arácnido, Jr. is fully Mexican.
(Half of spider-verse is just country humans but make it Spider-Man.)
Hot take. Are you prepared to back that up?
(Not really, no.)
"Well, what are your parents?" Wade asked instead.
"I don't know, white people?"
"You don't know?" Wade repeated, dripping in insinuation.
(Ask him if he likes Dragon Ball.)
"You will not try and convince me I'm Mexican," Peter bit out, again returning to the original task of finding batteries and vaguely ignoring Wade.
"It's like Catherine Zeta-Jones all over again."
"Wait," Peter stopped, again, looking at Wade. (Way to make a 5-minute task take 30 years.) "What do you think Spider-Man is?"
"I try not to make assumptions."
"Oh, so now you don't make assumptions."
"But I wondered if he might be, you know, estranged from his culture or something. I mean why else would someone like Masacre more than me if not for the shared heritage?"
"Or maybe he's just cute?" Peter replied like it was obvious.
"Cute?"
"He has a cat."
"It's a jaguar."
"Is that supposed to make him sound less cool?"
"Cool is different than cute- and he's a cheap copy of me drawn from memory. He's a bootleg Wolfwood without any of the nuance, he's rip-off Justin Law–he has one comic, appears in 4 fanfics, and 0 pieces of fanart!"
We can change that.
(Hey, let's turn this into a Masacre fanfic, that'd be fun.)
"You don't even know what he's saying," Wade continued. "Neither of you speak Spanish! This is what we in the industry call an outrage."
(Not to be that guy, but Batman speaks Spanish.)
This is the second time, what is up with you? We keep mentioning Batman just write a Batman fic.
(Have you read the Spider-Man crossover comics with Batman? There's also Superman ones which seem irrelevant to the topic at hand.)
We are losing the plot.
(And who's fault is that? Do your job or stop complaining, I want to get to the kissing part.)
There is no kissing part.
(What's the point of the slash tag then?)
I don't know that's not in my jurisdiction!
"Bye Wade," Peter said with more than just a hint of amusement in his voice.
He raised his hand, both showing the battery he grabbed and waving, as he walked away.
Wade just watched him go,
(We're just gonna let him do that?)
Yeah.
(This feels like the moment in the romcom where the main character and the manic pixie love interest meet cute, and then "go their separate ways" as if we'll never run into each other again.)
If you consider Peter the love interest, then yeah, I guess it could swing that way.
Except I don't think I get the girl in the end.
Are we genuinely considering Peter a love interest character now? What did I miss?
(Slow burn, enemies to lovers- oh yeah, I see it now.)
Shut it, of course not. I'm talking about Spider-Man.
(We need a tie-breaker.)
It's not written yet as far as I can see.
(But what do you think?)
I think… I think we're all just seeing what happens.
Remember to vote 'Deadpool wins' in the comments down below.
That's not how it works.
Find the author's socials or email at-
Stop that.
The people yearn for a smut scene.
I assure you they do not.
A kiss? Premarital hand holding?
The people don't know what they want.
(Does Spidey have superhuman stamina like us?)
Maybe. Why?
(Just wondering how long our sex would last.)
Dude.
If it's not bed breaking Edward Cullen levels I don't want it.
Dudes!
(Is it wrong to want Spidey–our Spidey–to be gay instead of just looking towards another character? Like Web-Weaver? I mean that's what Stan Lee and Fabian Nicieza were saying? Is inclusion, at the end of the day, exclusion?)
They weren't talking about fan fiction.
(I mean, there are the people who put their favorite characters through the shit they've gone through because they want to see themselves represented in someone they like. And then there are the other people who wouldn't wish themselves onto anyone and can't imagine inflicting that onto a character who wasn't written that way let alone one they like. And I don't know where the line is because why should it be any different than the people who write the "canon."
Wade do you like being in fan fiction or do you prefer canon?)
I mean, I think it's all kind of fan fiction the minute it's not written by my creators i.e. Fabian Nicieza and Rob Liefeld. Being published doesn't make it any more valid. They don't carefully choose the authors to write their stories thinking "yeah this guy really understands the character and the world and won't make a comic that is self-insertive or fantasy fulfillment." It's more like, and excuse my French here, "he's a man." Sometimes good, sometimes shit. There's great things out there that aren't canon–a canon because the multiverse is a thing–who am I to tell you to stop?
(I always hated that in school. The pedestal that classics stood on because they were "classics." I always hated in school this idea in writing of knowing the rules before you break them because that's not really what they're saying. Creative writing is not academic writing, and yet we're taught as if all writing is academic in it's root. Creative writing isn't something we can pursue until we can write like a scholar. But if we do that, our writing will never be "creative" and we're not creating classics. And it doesn't stop when you think it will. You could be a genuine pantser like Margaret Atwood and Mark Twain before you, but suddenly you're being forced to write an outline demarcated with act 1-3 and a midpoint in the middle because your professor is convinced it'll make your story better. Writing is poetry before it's an argumentative essay. Start that sentence with and. Writing is more subjective than they'd have you believe.
I hate grammar the way it's taught. There is no such thing as broken English. If I speak a sentence and you understand it, then it is correct. If you ask for clarity I will give it. That's not a failing on either of us.
You guys aren't saying anything, does that mean you think I'm right?)
You shouldn't say things only to be validated.
(Cop out.
Writing is about leading a horse to water. Because when I reference Mercy by Rudy Francisco I cannot make you read it, and when he mentions Allowables by Nikki Giovanni, he cannot know that you know what he's talking about. I bring you to these poems and in a perfect world you will read them, and in a perfect world you will find yourself reading 10 legs, 8 broken by user68519586 on TikTok, all by yourself, only to find that there is roots to even that to Althea Davis' Kinder Than Man which just brings me back to Mercy.
But as the saying goes, writing is also about knowing you can't make the horse drink. Why should you do all that? I can also believe readers should be allowed to just read what has been given to them. If you're not thirsty, you're not thirsty. There are some people who aren't even going to read this because they skim and go straight to dialogue and that's cool too. There's no right way to read.
There's no right way of analysis. You could use practical criticism of just the words on the page, or cultural where you look at the context around it all. Maybe you think it's all about reader-response criticism– I don't know I'm not your English teacher. Reading isn't homework, reading can be fun.
You just read it. Nothing else is asked of you. This isn't two truths and a lie except I refuse to elaborate what is which. Your own sense of curiosity is completely in your own hands without penalty. I'm asking for your time, but I'm not owed it. We're not owed anything.
Authors have to trust the readers. You have to trust that they're picking up what you're putting down and they might not say it, but someone somewhere is reading this and saying, "OMG I see what you did there." You can't hold their hand. And I know what you're thinking, you're thinking "I'll put it in the notes" but do you think when you write a novel–if you ever actually sit down and write something to be published–that you will have author's notes at the end of chapters to scratch that itch of being understood and agreed with that we all crave–you have to let that go–or to talk about how smart you are for doing this thing–you have to let that go. And I know this is fanfiction, it's not a novel. This is one of those spaces where readers and writers coexist. You're entering into my space, into my head, so yes I will explain my process for the people interested while they're here.
That's the devil talking.)
You only say it's the devil because of arbitrary decisions you've made for yourself. Writing is never done, it's just published and abandoned. But it keeps living in this perpetual state of offer, to be gazed upon and interpreted and judged. For fanfiction all of this is consolidated in this one place. This is where it's supposed to go, the designated footnote so you don't have to go scrounging for interviews or tweets that turn into secondary sources.
You are not proving your intellect by speaking about your art, and you're not dismissing that of the reader either. You are simply looking at the same thing from opposite sides and trying to communicate what it is exactly you see. It's not pretentious. Overexplaining and underexplaining are both acts that can be done in fear.
(Brave New World, ranked top 100 books, features A/B/O dynamics. One of the most heartwarming movies I saw last year about love has the main plot revolve around accidental mpreg. Treating fanfiction as a separate entity to writing degrades the art, as if it is something lesser and so there are exceptions. But the content is all the same.)
It's just a different medium. Writing is equal parts career and hobby, and people are allowed to have hobbies. Fanfiction and traditional publishing have about as much in common as MLA citation versus APA. A book can never be a comic and because of that, a comic has more liberties than a book may ever have. But that doesn't stop adaption.
We don't look the same. You're supposed to be yellow thinking boxes, but the best a strictly written medium can do is enclose you in parentheticals and call you the same. But you're not the same. A possum will never be an opossum no matter how hard you try to make it look like it or how well you succeed at convincing people.
(If you file off the serial numbers, is it still fanfiction? How many planks can you replace before it's no longer the original ship? If you burn off your fingerprints and shred your birth certificate, who are you now?)
There is a comfort in souls. The rose by any other name.
Is this all you guys are going to do?
No.
Wade, finally, made his way to the checkout to, finally, pay for his items and put them, finally, in a bag so he wouldn't be holding everything. (Finally.)
You act like it's my fault this happens 4,945 words in. You're the narrator and you're derailing.
Yeah, narrator. Not the author.
(Be honest, it's all just ramblings of a madman, you can skip what you don't want to read.)
Yeah, like the kissing parts.
(There are kissing parts?)
Please tell me it's with Spidey.
No. There are no kissing parts.
(Then why did you say there were?)
For one second, think with the head in your brain. Has Spidey even shared a straw with you?
(You bring up a good point. This is a dude who doesn't like being touched, why would he want to mix fluids and mush nasties.)
Ew.
(Exactly.)
One time we told Spidey we had a boner and he immediately left the rooftop.
(I was there for that.)
So with this knowledge we-
(Okay, but hypothetically, if Spidey doesn't care about sex in both meanings of the word, that means we have a chance right?)
Chance of what?
The question is: is it sex or is it dicks?
(Maybe it's your dick specifically.)
He hasn't even seen it yet though.
Listen to me. I don't think this is a guy who has sex period, y'all are just weird. You're telling me he doesn't drink or smoke or even really curse, but the dude can fuck? Not buying it.
(The 90s McFarlane Shirtless kinky era was for freaks.)
It's me. I'm freaks.
Pervert. (Verb; alter (something) from its original course, meaning, or state to a distortion or corruption of what was first intended. Ex. Spider-Man was perverted from a PG character during the McFarland run of comics.)
I didn't make it! I was just an unassuming fan consuming the official content of my favorite superhero it's not my fault I had an awakening and Rule 34 exists. Who told you Spider-Man was supposed to be family friendly anyways? He was just supposed to be relatable to teens and grow up with them.
(If we're talking about creative decisions, I'd like mention that I'm adverse to just how many love interest that man gets. Like seriously, we need to have a chat. Also, he had love interest! Why can't that be us?)
You realize your entire argument just sounds like it's out jealousy now.
(No I promise I'm not a hater. In fact, here's my ranking of canon gay Spidey ships.)
Canon is used very loosely here.
I'm listening.
(Number one is us, obviously. We're heartmates and have two children together.)
A borderline invented term mind you.
See now you're the hater. We say I love you in the Spanish dub.
(Coming in two has to be Moon Knight because they most definitely were a situationship and Moon Knight has a Spidey alter but also they've been the same person where Spidey has a Moon Knight alter- does that make it selfcest?)
No.
Kinda sounds like Spidey has a type. Maybe if I wear my white suit, he'll fall in love with me.
(Three and four we have SpideyTorch and SpideyDevil respectively and that's because I love me a good strong male platonic bond.)
Tolkien would have loved them.
Can't believe Star Trek is credited with originating gay slash fic when Lord of The Rings was right there.
(Lastly is the tragic one-sided romance of SpiderVenom. Points off for the friendzone, we know what it's like buddy.)
Since Spidey is confirmed not a monsterfucker, then if we have sex, that means I'm not a monster. Win win.
That is incredibly sad. Do you realize that?
(My thing is that making Spider-Man bi doesn't change the fact that, generally accepted, MJ is endgame in the main continuity as long as Marvel writers finally agree to let Spidey grow as a character. People genuinely don't want that much out of Bider-Man. And I'm not saying you can't have straight characters because that's stupid. I'm just saying it's wrong to get mad at people for seeing the undertones you put into the character.)
I feel like that's not the case here. It's not being mad at undertones, it's being mad that you think there are undertones. There's a certain level of complexity that comes with bi spider-man discourse specifically, and it's hard to boil it down to a simple paragraph.
(I think some of the problem comes with the misconception that gay and bisexual people experience relationships completely differently than straight people when that's not true. It's assuming that your sexuality will make you act a certain way and because Spider-Man was never explicitly written as someone who wasn't straight, then he can never not be straight. But that just isn't true.
Making Spider-Man bi doesn't really change the character. We don't take anything away from him when we do that. We don't take anything away from him when we make him gay either. Like Jessica Drew, Ultimate Spider-Woman went on a journey discovering herself. That's all it is. Coming of age doesn't strictly mean turning 18. It's just about learning.
It brings it back to that contract that people point to saying Spider-Man is "not a homosexual" and his alter ego is "heterosexual" and that's cool, I get it. You'd rather a creepy wolverine than a bi-curious Spider-Man. That's not weird at all.
Counterpoint: I think if we take away that pretense that romantic relationships must also be sexual–I see you sex-repulsed individuals–and the one note portrayal of romance in movies, then we get a chance to see something a little more special in these characters. That's what attaches people, you know. What makes JohnLock popular. There is no sex and there is no kissing and handholding and saying "I love you" and maybe they don't like boys and never even thought it was possible to look at one that way, but fuck do they love each other in a way that isn't replicated in other romantic relationships you've tried to sell me.
I'd love you if you were a worm because you're not a worm, you're my love no matter form. I'd love you in any universe because I don't know when and I don't know how, but I've fallen in love with you beyond something I can see. I have seen you as a gust of wind and a speck of dust and I have loved you. I want you to know, just as The Litte Prince said before me, that "there might be millions of roses in the whole world, but you're my only one, unique rose.")
So glad my romantic feelings are back on Spider-Man, was starting to think Parker saddled us with unnecessary feelings.
"You're still here," Peter asked without the intonation of a question.
He'd also bought what he came here for, but somehow both of them have still haven't left.
"I like how they put the condoms next to the pregnancy tests," Wade said back. "That's like putting epi-pens next to peanut butter."
Peter tilted his head slightly.
"I don't think so."
"Best two out of three."
"The jury disregards."
"Like Lactaid pills next to whole milk ice cream."
Peter scrunched his face in disapproval.
"Hint: they're opposite ends of the spectrum. It's a preventative next to the thing that's trying to be prevented. Think consequences of your actions."
"Eye patches next to safety glasses."
"Niche, but essentially."
"Hey if I don't take safety glasses, I'm going to need an eye patch when I shoot my eye out."
(Oh, the Red Ryder Carbine-Action 200 shot range Model air rifle, they could never make me hate you.)
Petter hummed, then:
"Listen, do you want to head back to my place?"
Wade didn't answer immediately.
(Just say yes Wade.)
The reason he struggled to just simply say yes to these requests from Peter, is that he feels like he goes behind Spidey's back by inserting himself into the civilian life he knows Spidey has. It feels like showing up at your friend's work just because you know they work there, ignoring the fact they've always tried to separate their work life and social life.
Spidey once asked him why Wade spent his free time stalking Peter.
"I have better things to do most days," Wade had argued. "I just get curious sometimes."
He's not sure if Spidey actually knew, or just had suspicions. At the very least, he didn't seem to know how much time Wade spent. Peter, from what Wade always saw, looked like the paranoid type. More than just looking around a lot like he thought someone was watching him, he also chose to sit with his back against a wall and liked keeping windows or doors in his view.
It makes sense when you think about it. The newspaper said Peter wasn't there when the burglary happened, but you don't have to be there for it to stick into your brain. Especially with the absence.
"What do you do with your free time?" Wade had asked Spidey.
"I don't really have free time," he had replied. "I'm Spider-Man. I have downtime, sometimes, but not free time. Most days I only give myself between 10 and 5 to be a civilian."
He's seen people complain that Spidey isn't really lowering day to day crime, but that seems unfair. He can only reduce it so much.
In the beginning Spidey probably did have his work cut out for him, but it's a quieter city now than it's ever been–super villains don't attack every day. There's lower lulls and a higher peaks, and sure that's not good but Spidey deals with it. You can't ask or expect him to fix the root cause of crime when he doesn't have that power. He can't give neighborhoods more money or improve education. He can't stop you from having a bad day. He's just here to tell you that you can have a better one.
Even if he won't be there to see it.
"Does sleep count as civilian time or spider time?"
"It counts as sleep."
Wade had wondered how many heroes and vigilantes say it the other way. "I'm only in the mask from 5 to 10." Wade is Deadpool is Wade 24/7.
(There's really no way to say it equally. One of them has to be the job. Even if you create balance, hypothetically, there's priority. I have to dawn the mask now, whichever way that might be.)
"What do you do with your free time?" Wade asked Peter.
"I don't really have free time," he replied. "I don't have enough time actually."
"What do you do all day?"
"Pretend to be alive?"
He's grown into more than just a Spider-Man photographer, or rather the only Spider-Man photographer. There's little else out there. Something that circled for a bit was a screenshot from a bad quality news casting of Spidey getting kissed by this dark-haired lady with a bun. (Wade brought it up once, and Spidey said "We don't talk about that, Wade." It was cold enough to send a chill down our spine. The image has since been scrubbed from the internet.) After Peter won a Pulitzer Prize and the Bugle published Webs, a collection of Spider-Man photos he took including the first high-quality photos of the vigilante, people started supporting him with other photos. There's really not much else to "Peter Parker" except a portfolio of photos. In his research, Wade scrounged all of those ever credited to him and the most you found was a feeling of him growing into the career–which makes sense given he started as a teenager.
But that's the thing that didn't make sense about Peter. He gave up a life of science and tech to take niche photos that are as counterculture in technique that he is in life, all because he kept a nonfunctioning camera hidden in the back of his closet.
He's like a midwest emo vocalist singing next to the pop 100. But there's something about his rawness and maybe even his lyricism–or perhaps the drums in the back and a guitar riff are distracting you just enough that you think it's good, and you can't help but choose him over everyone else.
I think I like this outfit.
It's far from special. (Show me a person whose style inspo is purely the Nesquik rabbit.) It's the Pearl Jam shirt and baggy pants and when he's worn it before Wade probably would have told him to change because the colors don't match or the textures and it's layered weirdly but somehow, on Peter, it works.
Just on Peter.
There's no performance. He's never trying to be more than he is or any different. That's what we always liked about Spidey. He breaks our balls about the no killing rule not because it keeps his image clean, but because he genuinely believes it.
It makes Wade sick only because he knows what Spidey sees in him. He sees it too.
It's like having nothing bad you can say about your ex's new girlfriend because she is prettier and funnier and nicer than you.
It's admitting you're wrong. That you've always been wrong.
(I wonder if people worry about Peter.)
What do you mean?
(Tchaikovsky, the famous Russian composer, had a patron, Nadezhda Von Meck, who gave him a stipend with the one condition that they never meet in person–truly abiding to the idea of never meeting your hero. But they wrote letters to each other for 13 years, exchanging a total of 1,200. They did meet face to face once though, and it was by accident. It's said they were both embarrassed and awkward, exchanged no words except Tchaikovsky tipped his hat to her and that was it. He wrote a letter to apologize, and her response was that it was an unnecessary apology, and he was welcome to visit her place and check out her new paintings. Granted, she would not be there.)
You've lost me.
(Letters are curated, you don't come off the same in written word that you do in person, whether or not that's on purpose. Even after they were face to face, she protected their distance. When Nadezhda ended the relationship, she claimed bankruptcy. But maybe her children strongly thought she should, and maybe it had to do with how ill she was. They died one after the other, and not far from the last letter either. And so they never met.
Peter Parker, consciously or not, made himself indispensable in the Spider-Man space with his photography, despite the person he's doing it for. And I wonder if anyone, like Nadezhda, doesn't want it ruined for them. If they worried that learning about Peter would reveal something they wish wasn't true. I wonder if people hold their breath and feel relief at just the claim "flaky" There's not much out there about Peter, and I wonder if people want it to stay that way.
We know what it's like to grow disgusted with the people you once held in high esteem. Artists whose work you felt deeply, even recommended, only to bear witness to actions from them you can only condemn. Sometimes I wonder if the world would do better anonymous. But I know that hurts. There's already so much loss of ownership and loose consent, especially when posting online–photography, art, writing, even your likeness–that the answer can't be to take the rest of it away.)
People like to take and run with the idea that F. Scott Fitzgerald plagiarized his wife, Zelda, but it's more complicated than that. They were a toxic and awful relationship–they were both the problem. Not just Zelda, but not just Scott either. Did he publish stories she wrote under both of their or just his own name? Yes, and allegedly with consent because they needed money. She wrote an article, humorously some say and with the intent to market, saying Scott adapted passages from old diaries of hers and he did, he believed those were free game because it was their life together. He also stifled the release of her own novel from insecurity. I think he did take from her, but I think they took from each other.
I think sometimes the people who talk about this don't know what it means to write like they wrote, or rather they don't understand. They wrote from life–it's about taking the essence of someone and putting it in their own books. Writers take from real people, not to pass it off as their own, but to make something real. Scott called her his muse. He can't write something Zelda told him or Zelda wrote down and put a footnote that it came from her, just like any other author who uses an idea they've heard from a friend or text message sent to them can't directly credit that friend when it gets put in their work.
Scott was wrong to do the things he did to her. We can argue whether he went too far, with this in mind, but this isn't the plagiarism everyone thinks they're talking about.
I want to instead invite you to think about Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette who's first novels, the Claudine series, was published under her husband's name, keeping the royalties even when they went on to divorce. You give her no chance if her only option is anonymity.
(I know that just because they aren't credited, I struggle to accept it means they don't exist in a way I wouldn't agree with. Perhaps the mere existence of the anonymous work is itself proof that they haven't done nothing I deem wrong. I've been disappointed by the guise of anonymity before. I've been lied to by disclaimers saying these opinions do or don't reflect the author's thoughts.
We know Peter. We don't like what he's done and not knowing it doesn't get rid of the fact that he did it.)
George Eliot was a writer who does not exist. He's a pseudonym for a lady named Mary Ann. And you might feel in your gut how sad it is that yet another woman felt the need to use a male name in order to be taken seriously. But that's not the full story. Mary Ann was living with and calling a married man her husband. The pseudonym did more than detach her from the struggles of womanhood in society, it also protected her from connecting her work to her own controversy and the scrutiny that would follow. Her anonymity under Eliot doesn't erase the full story, just hides it.
(I understand why we can't divorce the creator and created, why the separating art from the artist debate doesn't have an easy answer, that there is no abstraction that makes something come into the world for me and you without root. But if I can have just the stick, do I need to see the tree?)
Think of Marcel Duchamp and his alter ego, Rrose Sélavy. She is a facet of him–Rrose is him dressed up as a woman, with a pun for a name, and photographed. Yet there is a body of work credited under the name Rrose. Must we recognize Duchamp when it is Rrose we are admiring? When we take away him and his intentions, does that salvage what we feel? Can we even call Rrose "her"?
Rrose is photographed with a ring–married to Duchamp. At the very least, he wants you to know.
(How unrealistic it is to want a way to assure myself you align with certain morals I've deemed necessary at all times–I don't even align with my morals most times–so I don't have to feel the pain of being hurt by someone and something I've let myself love. I don't think the problem is loving; however, I think it's being scared of being hurt, as if that's not an integral part to loving.
You will be hurt. You'll be hurt by people you can't hurt back. It's not a mistake to open yourself up with the possibility that the stranger on the other side hates you. It's not insanity to do it again and again.
I can't, in good conscience, tell you that you're wrong if you don't wish to do so though.
I like knowing, thinking, I live in a world where people can see parts of my psyche–even the most intimate part–in the best light because I want a chance. Like it or hate, I don't want to be given up on before I can prove myself.
It'd rather make a choice than simply be born bad.)
"And they call me morbid."
"Okay, yeah, uh, I don't know," Peter said. "I work, I guess. Hang out with people."
"Who?"
Peter motioned loosely between the two of them, then added:
"You don't know them. Probably."
"Yeah, and I bet your girlfriend lives in Canada," Wade mocked.
"She's Canadian."
"Wait, maybe I know her."
"Wade, I don't have a girlfriend."
"Why would you lie?"
"I didn't lie-"
"What happened to that girl you knew? The redhead you were with at Osborn and Stacy's funeral?"
Two out of three high-profile deaths–the Gwen one a little less, but still not without coverage–and she had been with Peter at both of them. Wade knew her name, but he wasn't going to say it out loud first. He didn't know their relationship though, and no one would really be able to guess from the outside in.
Actually, Wade's never seen Peter touch anyone period. Spiders, big ones, spread out–Spidey spreads out. He's half of Wade yet always manages to take up the same amount of space. Peter keeps his arms and legs inside the vehicle at all times and slouched.
"She," Peter hesitated, "she moved away. She had big dreams and moved a lot as a kid, so- she's not really the type of girl to stay in one place so long. And she couldn't really deal with the… the death. Deaths. It was hard for her staying in the city. She left for Europe and never really came back. Here at least."
"Why did you stay? You've lost a lot to this city too."
"And my aunt is moving to Boston too so not much going on for me," Peter affirmed to himself. Then asked his own question with: "Why'd you move here?"
"The better question is do I like it here. And," Wade hesitated, "it's weird, honestly. I don't really feel Canadian, but I know I'm not American."
Wade also knows he doesn't exist, but that was a separate issue.
"The same way I don't feel immortal, but I know I'm not exactly mortal either," he added. Then brought it back: "You ever thought, hey, maybe things would be better out west?"
Peter hummed.
"Once."
"Where?"
"Portland."
"Portland?"
"It was something MJ said," Peter shrugged. "But New Yorkers… when you're born here no matter however far you go, the city calls you back. I'm going to die here."
"Sounds like you already have."
"What?"
"Did you love her?" Wade redirected.
"MJ?" Peter's hand went to the nape of his neck, and he turned to face a little to the left of Wade. (That's answer enough in a way.) "Does a birdcage love a bird?"
"Wow, Mr. Metaphor out here."
Peter didn't respond for a beat. Then:
"I asked her once how she could be content every time she moved. Because she didn't- she never hated anywhere. Sure, she had her favorite places, but she could always like and find things to like about wherever she was. She never thought grass was greener, just grass. And she told me that you have to find contentedness with yourself first. If you're always looking for more, you'll never be happy, but if you can hold onto something within yourself, maybe you can externalize that somehow, then you'll be happy no matter where you go."
It was like a stupor, almost, the way Peter spoke like he was actively analyzing his thoughts. His mind working faster than others while he went through a mini scientific method–sharing thoughts included.
"She's just good at this stuff. She's extraverted and pretty and funny and nice and happy. She knew how to be happy, and New York didn't make her happy anymore. Me included."
He turned back to Wade, slightly looking up at him beneath his eyebrows. (Do you think he knows he's Kubrick Staring or does he just do that?)
"Why do you care?" Peter asked, pointedly.
"Just thinking about love," Wade replied with a shrug.
"And what about it?"
"That I get incredibly depressed when I burn a pancake," Wade started.
Peter disarmed. His shoulders relax and he tilted his head upward towards Wade in a way that softened his gaze.
"Pancakes," Peter repeated.
"I know I know," Wade said, and he actually started to head out onto the street–there's less vulnerability when you're on the move–with Peter falling in step beside him, "but I feel like a genuine failure. Anemic? Thin ice, but burnt? And Spidey, he bullies me to hell and back you know, I was prepared to feel worse when the first time I made him an after-patrol meal I burnt the pancake."
Spidey had been going through Wade's playlists, perched in the corner of the kitchen and commenting on his music taste like he was on trial.
"Dude," he had said, "you have like 8 versions of Creep on here and then Upside Down by Jack Johnson from the Curious George soundtrack."
He didn't know why he messed up, but he remembered flipping the pancake and getting met with pure and utter disappointment in the form of a dark circle staring back at him. Spidey had sensed it–there isn't something he can't sense–and had looked upon that very same pancake before Wade could do anything to hide his shame.
"But he just," Wade continued, "he looks at me and he says- and it's not like he soothes my feelings and pats me on the back cuz it's 'not that bad.' Shit doesn't work. He just cracks a joke. 'One in every 372,844 pancakes is emo.' He made me laugh. I think that's what love is."
Twelve pancakes later, Wade had asked Spidey what his favorite tv show was.
"Comedy Bang! Bang! Yours?"
Golden girls, no hesitation. His katanas were named Bea and Arthur.
Wade grew up with the whole "boys don't cry" era. He can gather that from context clues and the lingering sentiments elicited by the phrase when he reached into the back recesses of his mind.
He was older by the time he stumbled upon a rerun of the show on daytime television. He watched the remainder of the episode, and then all of those that followed. Wade was charmed, but not enraptured just yet. That came later, when he was dreaming he was Bea Arthur, not in any episode he had seen, but just an old lady with her old lady friends smiling and laughing–it was the happiest he had ever felt, emotions he'd never felt before and would never feel again.
He woke up already crying. He had succumbed to such a profound sense of loss. To a life that wasn't his, that he'd never have. He had experienced pure euphoria only to have it stripped away from him and kept forever out of reach.
Maybe boys did cry. Or maybe he wasn't a boy.
Either way, being with Spidey is the closest he's ever felt to that dream.
They're walking, Wade can assume, towards Peter's apartment.
We'll just walk him there.
(And then he'll ask if we'd like to come up-)
"Now if only I looked like Jessica Rabbit," Wade added.
"You can't do serious moments, can you?"
"What can I say-"
"I know Spidey looks like this guy who doesn't want anything to do with you and your feelings, but he's not really like that. No one likes people who can't switch it off. Ever watch a Hallmark Christmas movie?"
"See you just made it a joke again."
"Yeah well," Peter trailed off. "In baseball there's this pitch called a knuckleball pitch that has an erratic trajectory, so if you're a knuckle ball pitcher you have a dedicated catcher who can actually catch the ball. It's like being baseball married."
"Is that what you think love is?"
"For some people."
"I once killed a lady because she said she wanted to sleep with Spidey," Wade said simply.
Peter faltered.
"You did what?"
They're outside of Peter's apartment. He's supposed to say bye, but instead:
"I shot a lady through the skull and 15 times on top of that because she was lusting after an underage him."
Peter attempted about three different sentences, but none of them formed.
"Maybe you think this was little too far but I–don't ask–went back in time so I could track down and kill every person making sexualized comments about Spidey in his first year. He was just a kid. He didn't need that, and the world was better off without those people. You never noticed the lack of herofuckers talking about him in Spidey discourse?"
He's never told, of course. He didn't do it for brownie points. Wade simply did it.
We would have gone back further if we could, stopped the original sin, but it was just out of his reach.
"He…would… not be okay... with… that?" Peter questioned without a hint of confidence in his voice.
"I think he would be."
"Would he be?"
Sometimes people forget that teenagers are just as much children as those younger than them. Wade doesn't.
"I just don't think he needed to see that about himself. Listen, if I say he's a minor and they take it back they're fine. I get it, no one knew. I'm not unreasonable. But I don't fuck around when it comes to kids. Period. And it pisses me off that people can say what they want about children because age of consent this and laws that–there's no flip of a switch. Teen Spidey and Adult Spidey understand sexual comments all the same and I know him and I know that's exactly what he doesn't associate with himself. I know I'm part of the sexualization of society, but I have my line- I always have my fucking line."
(Have we devalued the meaning of taboo? Or maybe media has desensitized taboo subjects because why else is the "incest subplot" a trope?
Dick Wolf lives on thin ice. He comforts those who need it and disturbs the comfortable just like Cesar A. Cruz said art should, but maybe over 2 dozen seasons of SVU becomes too much. Maybe it's not enough when their cases are still happening in real life. Normalizing these conversations is needed and good, but that's not all it does.)
Wade learned to drown out his murder with more murder. It gets easier the more you kill, the more you tell your brain it's okay. It's the seed of doubt that keeps you up at night.
It's not taking a life when he kills a room of people, it's entertainment. They're background characters without names or lives, drawn with less care than Wade is. You expect it, your eyes skim over it and you barely register it at all. To Wade, it's adrenaline and the rush is what you focus on. You don't feel anything you're not supposed to. You don't feel anything you're supposed to.
(We met the creator of beauty pageants–of child pageants in hell. We can't even watch the child version of cooking competitions. We don't really want children on our TV. I know that kids exist. I also know that there is no completely safe child and I guess that's part of life and whatever, but maybe child prodigies can wait. And if that means we wouldn't have Mozart, maybe worry about all the other Mozarts we could have had but didn't.)
Wade could kill kids. If he burned down an orphanage and blew up a school, he could kill kids. Murder is a domino effect. He won't take that first life because he doesn't want to be the person that road will take him down.
(There's a shame that gets taken away when we see something on TV, but I wouldn't say that's always a good thing. It's why some people cheat like they see happen in a show where the characters actions aren't demonized for plot, or when someone skips consent because they were making it like that one scene in their favorite movie. Everyone's a victim of it. We are monkeys who see and then do. Before TV it was our parents who set an example, whether it was good or bad. The option is always out of two. Stay, or go? Follow in the footsteps of what you've seen or unlearn what you've been taught.)
"I hate abuse," Wade continued. "I know, how brave of me but I hate that harassment is something some people, female presenting and not, just expect when they leave the house. Fuck the way males are treated when it comes to sexual assault. I hate that you're gay if you're abused by a man and you're 'lucky' if it was a women who perpetuated it. I hate when it's viewed as hot or funny. I hate to think of being a boy who thinks there isn't room for them to speak up. I hate to think of Spidey being leered at and being so attached to his secret identity that he can't even explain that he's a child. I hate to think of him growing up and growing into an age where that faux safety goes away. I can't stand him thinking it's something he just needs to deal with and get over like it's part of the job and it fucking shouldn't be. There's only two ways to go after that, hypo or hyper."
I don't want to have sex with Spidey. I joke here and there because he lets me, because I put him in control, but it's too unnatural for him. I don't know if this is the way he is, or if it's a manifestation of other experiences. There are things I don't even know I don't know.
I don't want to have sex with Spidey, I want a relationship devoid of physical affection where spooning for 10 seconds is too much. Where I hold my breath every time we brush knees or press our shoulders together. I want the world to think we're just friends so only me and Spidey know the truth because it's our secret. I want him to be weird about me. I want him to love me in that slightly inhuman way only he could.
"You know I get letters from kids who don't know who else or how else to ask for help," Wade continued. "That's really why I can't commit to the whole quitting merc work and no killing. I think Spidey supports me in some weird way.
"I was pissed the first time he stopped me when we came across this real degenerate creep. But I figured out pretty quickly that Spidey doesn't just tie people up for the police as a second thought. There's so many ways he does it, actually. In a net, stuck to a wall–I thought it was based on convenience for the longest time, but that makes him sound like an amateur. He webbed them upside down and somewhere a little too high. And then he said let's go."
"Did you?" Peter asked, quietly finding his voice.
"Do you know the shit that happens when you're upside down too long? It ranges from severely debilitating to fatal. Spidey's webs last as short as an hour and the police sometimes just, wait it out. That's a torture method by the way.
"Spidey left me unattended and it wasn't by mistake. I cut that web. They died on impact. Best case scenario would have been ending up a quadriplegic. Any better outcome and I'd have to assume God's favorite, but I assure you that a special place in hell waiting.
"I think Spidey was mad at me because he knew what I did when I followed him. It's like he tested me. He had asked to be trusted and I couldn't do that yet. All that time he was my idol because I thought I knew how he worked, but turns out I didn't understand him as much as I thought I did. I admired him a heck of a lot more, but I also stopped being, you know, his fan and started trying to be his friend."
In the beginning, without even realizing it, Wade had just been gathering information. This larger-than-life parasocial relationship right before his eyes and his only thought was how much more can I learn about this person when I'm now this close to them. He met his hero and wondered what he smelled like instead of how their day was. He'd been disgusted with himself. Wade couldn't shake off the image of himself–dirty the way you are when a car sprays muddy water all over you and you're covered head to toe with it–looking up at a shadow with empty and uncaring white eyes, squinted in disappointment. Wade's rarely felt so disturbed for killing. This is what religion feels like, the Daredevil way, but at least he is merciful god. (We do try not to deify him, that's not a stable base for any relationship. Plus his whole campaign is about being the "friendly neighborhood Spider-Man" as if the people are bigger than him even though he's a god among men.) Wade never tried to figure out his secret identity because he didn't want to feel like that version of him, scrounging for information rather than building a relationship.
"It sucked though," Wade continued. "I had fucked up and hurt his feelings over the whole trust thing. I don't think he ever really gave me a second chance until…"
"Until?"
"The anniversary."
The graveyard guards have Spidey's mourning on their calendars. They once blamed him for Captain George Stacy's death, but now New York City doesn't ask questions of it's vigilante.
"Oh you've got this old gal monologuing. Enough about me though, let's talk about-"
"What happened on the anniversary?" Peter urged, like he needed to hear Wade talk more than he needed the answer.
"I didn't speak to him."
We sat there with him, and we didn't say a word to him all day.
"Why?"
Peter still wasn't asking. He said the word strongly, and not kindly.
"Damn it Wade, please."
"I don't know."
"Please Wade."
Truth is, we just didn't know what to say. Where there weren't eggshells, there were landmines. He could have been asked to leave by breathing too loud. And something about Spidey just looked so lonely. Like old people in restaurants eating at a table for two alone.
Wade has been sad before and he has asked to be left alone, but it's never because he wants to be alone. He just wants to be left alone. He doesn't want anything asked of him- he doesn't want to be distracted either, he wants to be in this moment, feeling what he's feeling without someone consoling him.
And maybe Spidey didn't want to be heard, maybe he didn't even want to be looked at, but he has zero object constancy–Wade would bet money Spidey's just has disorganized attachment but convinced himself it's part of the job when it's actually him trying to protect himself in the only way he knows how–and just needed to know that there is someone supporting him.
"Tell me you know why it mattered," Peter added, looking away.
Though the way he sniffed betrayed him.
(He's crying.)
He's not crying.
(Hug him Wade.)
I'm not going to hug Peter Parker.
(Please.)
And slowly, Wade stretches his arms out. Peter doesn't react.
We're like a Venus flytrap. It's not quite a snap or sudden movement. Slowly, the mouth will simply close in on it's prey.
"Please, just tell me you know," Peter muttered, his cheek pressing against Wade.
There's no comfort in this hug, just like there's no emotion in Peter's tears, like the mere thought of shedding them had exhausted all the emotion he had to spare. Something about this had been important enough to peek over the wall, but not enough to lower the gates.
"I was willing to show up for Spidey when he wasn't being Spidey," Wade started. "I gave myself up and asked nothing of him. Because Spidey says he hates quiet nights, but that doesn't mean he never has a night where he wants it to stop-"
"I wish you would stop talking," Peter interrupted, muttering as if he was checking out of the conversation. "My biggest mistake was ever thinking you could put two and two together."
Wade… doesn't know what that means.
(There's an ambiguity in the POV here. It can go two ways. You as in you, Wade, or you as in one, someone.)
My biggest mistake was ever thinking you were smart was not a phrase that hurt Wade. There were worse things than people wrongly underestimating him. My biggest mistake was ever thinking you were different was not a phrase that hurt, Wade either. He wasn't trying to be different he just was, but if you want to pretend like Wade's your average joe that's your mistake. You can say he's obtuse and insensitive, but Wade is not someone who will let himself be taken advantage of.
But that–that he can't put two and two together–that was none of the above.
(You, Wade, have failed to understand something that was seemingly obvious, or perhaps it's Peter critiquing the idea of seeing the obvious. Are you the symptom or the problem?)
"Will you let go of me?" Peter asked softly, rather nicely too.
Surprised is not a good word, but it surprised Wade. He lets Peter extract himself before asking:
"Parker?"
Peter sighed.
"What is it Wade?"
"I know I don't deserve-"
"Stop. Say it the right way."
The part about self-improvement no one tells you about is you're not owed anything. That's what the self part stands for, no one has to see you through it. When you get sent to rehab away from your family it's because the first person that has to be there for yourself, is you. (That's not to say you need to be alone, Portugal heavily reduced their drug problem from the 2000s onward with incentivizing community, but you can deserve it without earning it.)
Sometimes people just can't be friends, even if the reason is a single bad habit, that's enough. You sound like an asshole but it's true that being around people that don't match your worldview or your personality, be it biochemical or other reasons, is draining. And getting annoyed makes sense and it's allowed. Not just when someone neurodivergent laments about speaking with neurotypicals, but when someone without anxiety talks about someone with it.
(The problem is thinking there's a villain. The human brain works to categorize, us versus them is innate and anything that is tied to identity begins to veer towards personal.)
And some people say that just because your sprained ankle isn't the same as that person's broken arm, it doesn't change the fact your ankle is sprained. But suddenly you're carrying this person because their leg is broken. And maybe it's been fucking months. What then? Can I lay down my sword then? (Sympathy for glass children, makes me want sympathy for glass friends who see through themselves for you.) Or just because neither of us are hurt it doesn't make you shitty to still say I can't deal with this part of you. And maybe it is anxiety or maybe it's how they handle money–I don't owe you my friendship just because we thought we could have one.
(I don't blame the frog for trusting the scorpion, but I don't blame the scorpion either. And if it's between needing and wanting, you don't need an explanation. Sometimes that's just how it goes.)
It's hard to be friends with someone willfully self-destructive. And Wade has little patience for people who don't want to change because if he could change, then they could too but they won't. They won't help themselves the way he had to. It doesn't matter that they're not Wade, it matters that they're not trying. We're friends and we're in this together and I need you to want to be better for both of us.
It's even harder to be friends with someone unwilfully self-destructive. But you still can't blame someone for making a choice just because you can't. If it's tiring for you, it's tiring for them too. If you could choose, you would. And you could choose differently, and it'll be your choice.
But nobody is better.
We cannot put Spidey on a pedestal because we are simply making him fall further when he does. It's also true that he might never fall, and that's because we pushed him far away enough that we could no longer reach him up there.
It's not easy changing. It's not easy being looked upon at eye level while we're trying. But when it's like this, it almost feels like everything you're trying to be is reachable, and maybe that makes it worth it.
"Peter," Wade started again, "I don't want to solve puzzles with educated guesses like we're superhero trivia."
"It's just about you knowing without telling you."
They want too much of each other. Wade knows it, Spidey must know it. Maybe that's why they haven't worked out. But the reason they do work is because they're not a frog and a scorpion, they're a spider and a frog. A wolf and a raven.
"I think we can meet in the middle somehow."
At the very least, they can try.